Exploring the Problem of Climate Change

Bali, the US, and beyond Kyoto

Representatives of 180 countries are in Bali at the moment to talk about Climate Change, at the United Nations Climate Change Conference. They’ve got almost two weeks to talk about a “roadmap for a future international agreement on enhanced global action to fight climate change in the period after 2012” (1), in what is the largest Climate Change Conference held to date.

Australia didn’t waste any time after getting rid of John Howard – they announced that they’re signing up to Kyoto at last, as the first official act of the new Government (2). With Kyoto in it’s final stages it’s a largely symbolic move really, but we need them on board just like everyone else, so it’s great news. It leaves the US as the only ‘first-world’ country not to have agreed to sign.

More recently in Bali, the US has been making a few headlines of its own. According to The Guardian, the US representatives at the conference said that a proposal for industrialised nations to reduce their emissions by 25-40% by 2020 was “totally unrealistic” and “unhelpful”, however the idea had been backed by the EU and Britain (3). Japan are also reported to be against the idea.

This is further indication (not that we need one) of US intention to come across as participating in climate change discussion while completely rejecting even a hint of participation in agreed emissions reductions. They have already made it quite clear that they don’t want the Bali conference to discuss actual numbers in relation to cuts. They would love to have goals, but goals that aren’t specified. Clearly they haven’t yet realised the clever idea of the British Government – create and sign up to as many targets and reductions as possible without actually expecting to be able to reach them.

But there does seem to be some good news coming from the across the water. Last Wednesday, the US Senate Environment and Public Works Committee voted to cut emissions by “about 70 per cent by 2050”(4) – a bold decision indeed, and not before time. Despite the fact that this is extremely unlikely to be enough of a cut to prevent two degrees of climate change (and therefore they might as well not bother), this gives the indication that slowly but surely things are starting to happen in the US Government.

But any encouragement that might be gained through this is soon shot to pieces when you discover that they are planning on using biofuels as a large part of their solution to fuelling their nations considerable car fleet. Apparently, half of these will be coming from sources that are not in competition with food production (4) – but that leaves another half that will. Not that it matters to them of course, because their country will be able to afford an escalating food price.

We shouldn’t expect too much from Bali. It should be kept in mind that the main objectives of the conference are “to launch negotiations on a climate change deal for the post-2012 period, to set the agenda for these negotiations and to reach agreement on when these negotiations will have to be concluded”(1). In other words start talking, talk a bit and then talk about when they should finish talking. In fact, listening to Yvo de Boer (the executive secretary) the only thing that seems to be definite so far is that there won’t be any definite new target when the conference ends (5).

Why not? Why not do it now? Take a few more weeks if needs be! Just agree something! As I see it, as long as a new agreed agenda includes scope for adjustment with the science on a regular basis a) it shouldn’t go far wrong and b) everyone can rest assured that they will have plenty of time to negotiate between re-evaluations.

This is a huge opportunity. The majority of countries on Earth are represented at this conference, and time is something we don’t have on our side. Climate change is not going to wait for more extended talks. We need a plan of action and here is a perfect opportunity to develop one.

The International Community needs to start addressing this issue with the drastic measures that it requires and the US needs to stop holding back progress in the misguided belief that it will somehow benefit their country.